I was an undergraduate studying bioethics in Toronto during the SARS pandemic in what seem like, in retrospect, much simpler times. Now, living in Texas, I'm finishing my PhD degree in the medical humanities. This current pandemic has provided me with an education in trust, scientific expertise, provider burnout, and social justice. It has invigorated my research examining how moral tensions in the therapeutic relationship are heightened when physicians write about patient care. Still, the inevitable comparisons, not just with being (...) in school back then but also with student life before the pandemic, bring... (shrink)

This paper argues that the newspaper Notre Journal enshrined the importance of narrative in the revolutionary psychiatry of its founder and editor, Frantz Fanon. Anchoring my analysis in the interdisciplinarity of the medical humanities, I demonstrate how care at Hôpital Blida-Joinville in colonial Algeria was mediated by the written word. I examine Fanon’s physician writing and editorial texts detailing the use of narrative approaches in the clinic. As an object of care, Notre Journal’s promotion of psychic healing, social actions, and (...) engaged professional practice shaped the interactions and experiences of patients and staff. Printed and distributed to the wider institution, the newspaper created community—during an oppressive French Occupation and at the outset of the War of Independence—in addition to nurturing creativity, curiosity, solidarity, and accountability. Still, Fanon would come to recognize the limits of narrative methods amidst cultural oral traditions, illiteracy, and divergent attitudes about narrating the self. (shrink)

This book examines the contemporary biopolitical significance of an emerging global market for oocytes. Reproductive cells specific to biological females, oocytes are increasingly circulated far and wide between social locations. Given the new possibilities for their use, management, and exchange, Waldby employs a feminist perspective to examine the gendered experiences that yield a highly personal valuation of oocytes. Drawing on Raymond Williams's "structures of feeling", she aims to give qualitative texture to the affective dimensions of human eggs and the complex (...) ways in which these intersect with the lives of women.New technical developments have rendered oocytes more profitable because they can... (shrink)

In order to ensure an adequate and ongoing protection of individuals participating in scientific research, the impacts of new biomedical technologies, such as Next Generation Sequencing , need to be assessed. In this light, a necessary reexamination of the ethical and legal structures framing research could lead to requisite changes in informed consent modalities. This would have implications for Institutional Review Boards , who bear the responsibility of guaranteeing that participants are verifiably informed, and in sufficient detail, to understand the (...) reality of genetic research as it is practiced now. Current literature allowed the identification of key emergent themes related to the consent process when NGS was used in a research setting. (shrink)

Le concept de « droit social » progressivement élaboré par le juriste social-démocrate Gustav Radbruch durant la République de Weimar ne saurait être réduit à un programme politique de législation sociale en faveur des travailleurs. Cet article entend montrer qu’il s’agit bien d’un concept théorique spécifique analysant la transformation structurelle à l’œuvre dans le droit, à savoir le passage d’un droit individualiste à un droit social considérant chaque individualité dans sa situation sociale au sein de la communauté – cette transformation (...) relevant elle-même de l’émergence d’une nouvelle conception de l’homme se substituant à celle de l’individualisme libéral. Cela permet à Radbruch d’envisager un droit adapté aux réalités de la société moderne et à même de penser la résolution de la contradiction entre égalité juridique et inégalités sociales. Si le droit social peut à ce titre apparaître comme un concept précurseur, l’insistance sur la nécessité de repenser l’articulation entre individu et communauté et les ambiguïtés que celle-ci engendre concernant le statut des droits individuels soulignent aussi l’ancrage de son discours dans les débats weimariens. (shrink)

Alors que les membres du Bassidj ont pour mission de persuader les pauvres de rester fidèles à la révolution et au régime, ils se joignent à eux pour critiquer sévèrement l’État qui ne tient pas ses promesses révolutionnaires de justice et d’égalité. L’exploration de ces dilemmes et de ces contradictions nous permet de comprendre la nature « contestée » de la loyauté envers le régime dans la République islamique, ainsi que la vie litigieuse de la politique révolutionnaire du Bassidj dans (...) les quartiers pauvres, dans un contexte d’inégalités flagrantes, d’économie en chute libre et de rébellion des pauvres. (shrink)

In this chapter Nathalie Sigot argues that Bentham’s interest in international trade lies in the consideration of the redistributive effects of trade and its consequences on happiness for one’s society. Sigot demonstrates that Bentham’s view on international trade changed between 1786 and 1821, when the principle of the limitation of industry by capital disappeared from his writings. Sigot explains how Bentham’s approach is driven by a focus on security and on a calculus of gains and losses in terms of (...) happiness. (shrink)

Dans le cadre de divers contextes insulaires, les auteurs, adoptant des approches exploratoires et interdisciplinaires, analysent les processus de (re)médiation des apprenants au savoir, en situation d'interactions authentiques à l'école et hors de l'école, en intégrant la question des cultures plurielles.

While methodological individualism is a fundamental approach within the social sciences, it is often misunderstood. This highlights the need for a discursive and up-to-date reference work analyzing this approach’s classic arguments and assumptions in the light of contemporary issues in sociology, economics and philosophy. This two-volume handbook presents the first comprehensive overview of methodological individualism. Chapters discuss historical and contemporary debates surrounding this central approach within the social sciences, as well as cutting edge developments related to the individualist tradition with (...) philosophical and scientific implications. Bringing together multiple contributions from the world’s leading experts on this important tradition of theorizing, this collective endeavor provides teachers, researchers and students in sociology, economics, and philosophy with a reliable and critical understanding of the founding principles, key thinkers and intellectual development of MI since the late 19th century. ​. (shrink)

This paper discusses the establishment of a governance framework to secure the development and deployment of “good AI”, and describes the quest for a morally objective compass to steer it. Asserting that human rights can provide such compass, this paper first examines what a human rights-based approach to AI governance entails, and sets out the promise it propagates. Subsequently, it examines the pitfalls associated with human rights, particularly focusing on the criticism that these rights may be too Western, too individualistic, (...) too narrow in scope and too abstract to form the basis of sound AI governance. After rebutting these reproaches, a plea is made to move beyond the calls for a human rights-based approach, and start taking the necessary steps to attain its realisation. It is argued that, without elucidating the applicability and enforceability of human rights in the context of AI; adopting legal rules that concretise those rights where appropriate; enhancing existing enforcement mechanisms and securing an underlying societal infrastructure that enables human rights in the first place, any human rights-based governance framework for AI risks falling short of its purpose. (shrink)

Black Existential Freedom looks at the ways in which Black cultural productions reflect a constant struggle for freedom and a refusal to surrender to the destructive forces of dehumanization. This book offers a counter-narrative to current Afro-Pessimist theorizations of Blackness that choose the power of death and nihilism over life.

Melancholia Africana argues that in the African and Afro-diasporic context, melancholy is rooted in collective experiences such as slavery, colonization, and the post-colony.

Research on the influence of industry on chemical regulation has mostly been conducted within the framework of the production of ignorance. This special issue extends this research by looking at how industry asserts its interests––not just in the scientific sphere but also at other stages of policy-making and regulatory process––with a specific focus on the types of tools or instruments industry has used. Bringing together sociologists and historians specialized in Science and Technology Studies, the articles of the special issue study (...) the arenas in which instruments and practical guidelines for public policy are negotiated or used. The aim is to observe the devices in the making or in action, from the selection of actors to the production of thresholds, criteria, and other technical regulations. The introduction highlights how industry influence on expertise and regulation is undoubtedly far more pervasive and multifarious than has been conceptualized to date by social scientists. Putting this issue back at the heart of both the STS and social sciences research agendas is increasingly urgent and could lead to new inquiries able to highlight these logics even more widely, using fresh empirical examples. (shrink)

It is important to understand the drivers of green consumption, because of growing concern for the health of the planet. In this paper, the assumption that a virtue-green product relationship exists is tested. The objective is to understand how product morality can influence the valuation of green products. Relying on virtue theory and positive spillover as conceptual bases, the research implicitly and explicitly tests and confirms green product virtue. The results demonstrate that perceived green product virtue leads to positive emotions, (...) which explain heightened purchase intentions. In line with the conceptualization, I show that the effect is moderated by the importance consumers place on their own morality. Importantly, explicitly framing green products as virtuous activates positive spillover by consumers; when green products are branded with a virtue cue, they encourage consumers to be more virtuous. Beyond being perceived as better people, when consumers interact with green products they effectively engage in more moral acts, such as making donations. The results confirm the perception of green products as moral agents and provide marketers with insights into the marketing value of virtue cues in green product consumption. (shrink)

La 4ème de couv. porte : "Depuis quelques années s'intensifient les rapports entre une société de l'information et une économie de l'attention : plus l'information est abondante, plus l'attention est rare. Alors que le travail se formule comme une lutte contre l'oisiveté et impose une certaine discipline de l'attention, la consommation, quant à elle, impose précisément de capter et perturber l'attention disciplinée. Progressivement, elle se monétise et progressivement, nous nous en sentons dépossédés. Pourquoi tenons-nous au concept d'attention? L'attention ne constitue (...) pas simplement un nouvel objet auquel l'éthique et la philosophie politique devraient s'intéresser. Loin de se limiter à développer une éthique appliquée de l'attention, problématiser l'attention nous amène à re-questionner les champs de l'éthique et de la philosophie politique. Pour répondre à ces questions, ce livre fait le pari de la pluridisciplinarité en rassemblant des travaux de différents horizons.". (shrink)

L’authenticité est peu étudiée par les économistes, quand est abordée, c’est à travers les liens qu’elle entretient avec la qualité. Nous montrons que tant qu’il était possible d’établir la qualité artistique de l’œuvre à partir d’un étalon prédéterminé, la question de l’authenticité se réduisait à celle d’attribution : comment les faux, les copies perturbent-ils le déroulement normal des échanges. Nous montrons l’apparition de la convention d’originalité au milieu du xixe siècle a conduit a opacifier la notion d’authenticité a été opacifiée. (...) Son registre n’est plus celui de la simple attribution mais également celui de la sincérité d’une démarche. Par ailleurs elle n’intervient plus seulement en aval mais participe à la définition même de la qualité. Pour être reconnue comme artistique, l’originalité produite ne doit pas être fortuite, mais refléter la sincérité de l’artiste. (shrink)

La dévotion au Christ puis à son cœur a son enracinement dans la tradition johannique de la conception du Dieu-Amour symbolisée par la plaie du côté du Christ sur la croix, considérée comme l’entrée vers son cœur. Elle a donné naissance à un courant spirituel homogène qui, de Marguerite-Marie Alacoque à Léon Dehon, met au centre de la théologie mystique, la dévotion à l’humanité du Christ. Celle-ci a une place privilégiée dans l’ordre des chartreux depuis les origines. Cette étude se (...) propose donc d’en évoquer les traces diachroniques à travers la triple thématique de l’imitation de Jésus-Christ, de la méditation de la Passion et de l’attachement sensible au cœur vulnéré du Christ, qui traversent les écrits cartusiens, notamment au XVIe siècle dans l’œuvre de Jean-Juste Lansperge et au XVIIe siècle dans celle de Dom Innocent Le Masson. (shrink)

Applied Evolutionary Epistemology is a scientific-philosophical theory that defines evolution as the set of phenomena whereby units evolve at levels of ontological hierarchies by mechanisms and processes. This theory also provides a methodology to study evolution, namely, studying evolution involves identifying the units that evolve, the levels at which they evolve, and the mechanisms and processes whereby they evolve. Identifying units and levels of evolution in turn requires the development of ontological hierarchy theories, and examining mechanisms and processes necessitates theorizing (...) about causality. Together, hierarchy and causality theories explain how biorealities form and diversify with time. This paper analyzes how Applied EE redefines both hierarchy and causality theories in the light of the recent explosion of network approaches to causal reasoning associated with studies on reticulate and macroevolution. Causality theories have often been framed from within a rigid, ladder-like hierarchy theory where the rungs of the ladder represent the different levels, and the elements on the rungs represent the evolving units. Causality then is either defined reductionistically as an upward movement along the strands of a singular hierarchy, or holistically as a downward movement along that same hierarchy. Upward causation theories thereby analyze causal processes in time, i.e. over the course of natural history or phylogenetically, as Darwin and the founders of the Modern Synthesis intended. Downward causation theories analyze causal processes in space, ontogenetically or ecologically, as the current eco-evo-devo schools are evidencing. This work demonstrates how macroevolution and reticulate evolution theories add to the complexity by examining reticulate causal processes in space–time, and the interactional hierarchies that such studies bring forth introduce a new form of causation that is here called reticulate causation. Reticulate causation occurs between units and levels belonging to different as well as to the same ontological hierarchies. This article concludes that beyond recognizing the existence of multiple units, levels, and mechanisms or processes of evolution, also the existence of multiple kinds of evolutionary causation as well as the existence of multiple evolutionary hierarchies needs to be acknowledged. This furthermore implies that evolution is a pluralistic process divisible into different kinds. (shrink)

To see "democracy as a tragic regime", as Cornelius Castoriadis did, is to recognize the ever-present risk of democracy’s cancellation, but it also means to emphasize the anti-democratic nature of such cancellation, thus its incompatibility with democracy. In the context of this understanding of democracy, the article takes the political to consist of those relations among people and among institutions within the polis, which aim at deciding about the polis’ fate. It takes the social to be those relations among people (...) and among institutions within the polis, to whom such decisions about the polis’ fate apply and whom they create. If democracy is understood as tension between the two, then the relation between those who decide and those who are subject of the decision is never entirely pacified – hence, always contested and in need of specification. Using the examples of the state of exception and totalitarianism (temporary and permanent self-cancellation), the article argues that these situations are outside a linear continuation with the democratic phenomenon and are due to a displacement, which is akin to the hubristic displacement. (shrink)

The fundamental difference between Castoriadis' and Papaioannou's accounts of the link between tragedy and the political is that Castoriadis insists on a political form whilst Papaioannou insists on a social actor. The starting point for this essay, then, are two thinkers: one whose main interest was a political and philosophical reflection on the social-historical and one whose main interest was a philosophical reflection on the arts. Surprisingly, however, the end situation is one where Castoriadis gives us a political explanation of (...) the link between tragedy and the political whilst Papaioannou gives us a social explanation of the same phenomenon. How can this difference be accounted for? First, distinguishing their respective conceptualisations of the political allows us to see that where one thinker privileges restlessness and revolution, the other privileges law and regime. Second, looking at their depictions of the essential aspects of tragedy places them on opposing sides of the couple hubris- dike, in a way that leads to two radically different conceptualisations of the relation in question. (shrink)

Human language, hominin tool production modes, and multimodal communications systems of primates and other animals are currently well-studied for how they display compositionality or combinatoriality. In all cases, the former is defined as a kind of hierarchical nesting and the latter as a lack thereof. In this article, I extend research on combinatoriality and compositionality further to investigations of everyday primate skills. Daily locomotion modes as well as behaviors associated with subsistence practices, hygiene, or body modification rely on the hierarchical (...) nesting of different behavioral and cognitive actions into complex skills. I introduce a scheme which uses hierarchical organization to differentiate combinatorial from compositional skills. Combinatorial skills are defined either as aggregational or linearly hierarchical depending on whether the skill occurs momentarily in space or unfolds sequentially over time. Compositional skills are defined either as nested or interactionally hierarchical depending on whether the skill results in new constructs or in new interactions between existing constructs. The methodology I propose combines epistemological hierarchy theory with data from primatological field research and experimental and comparative psychological research and provides a means to integrate current constructionist and extended views on cognition and action with older research on behavioral logics in psychology and operational chain thinking in anthropology. The approach furthermore synchronizes with ongoing research on teleonomy, intentionality, and creativity. -/- . (shrink)

Hence, argumentation will have an increasing importance in education, both because it is a critical competence that has to be learned, and because argumentation ...

Jean-Paul Sartre, philosophe, écrivain, dramaturge et grande figure de l'intellectuel politique, aura profondément marqué le XX siècle. Penseur de la liberté et de son envers, l'aliénation, de l'engagement et de la responsabilité, du pour-soi et de l'en-soi, de la conscience et du monde, du sujet et d'autrui, de la morale et de la mauvaise foi, du groupe en fusion et de la série, de la totalité et de l'Histoire, il est une voix originale de la Phénoménologie. Pour Sartre, l'homme est (...) tout entier libre et responsable de ses actes, sans excuse, et tout entier aliéné, parce qu'il est conscience de monde, position de soi dans une certaine situation - qui n'a de sens que pour une conscience libre. On se propose ici de parcourir son œuvre difficile et dense, de la Transcendance de l'Ego à L'idiot de la famille en passant par l'Être et le néant et Morale et Histoire, notamment. D'abord, la vie politique de Sartre pour dégager la cohérence de ses engagements. Ensuite, sa philosophie de la liberté, la découverte des philosophies de Husserl et de Heidegger, puis l'invention proprement sartrienne, la voie transphénoménale, qui permet de repenser le rapport de l'homme au monde avec le concept de cogito préréflexif, au croisement de la problématique de la liberté et de l'aliénation. Puis on restitue sa compréhension de la genèse d'une société, de l'Histoire et de ses conditions de possibilité, la force des conditionnements mais aussi la marge d'action de toute liberté. Vient après l'histoire d'une liberté en particulier, celle de Gustave Flaubert. A la suite, on traite de la morale et du sens qu'elle peut avoir pour une philosophie de la situation. On s'intéresse enfin au Sartre théoricien de la littérature, du théâtre et des arts. (shrink)

The article proposes to further develop the ideas of the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis by including into evolutionary research an analysis of phenomena that occur above the organismal level. We demonstrate that the current Extended Synthesis is focused more on individual traits (genetically or non-genetically inherited) and less on community system traits (synergetic/organizational traits) that characterize transgenerational biological, ecological, social, and cultural systems. In this regard, we will consider various communities that are made up of interacting populations, and for which the (...) individual members can belong to the same or to different species. Examples of communities include biofilms, ant colonies, symbiotic associations resulting in holobiont formation, and human societies. The proposed model of evolution at the level of communities revises classic theorizing on the major transitions in evolution by analyzing the interplay between community/social traits and individual traits, and how this brings forth ideas of top-down regulations of bottom-up evolutionary processes (collaboration of downward and upward causation). The work demonstrates that such interplay also includes reticulate interactions and reticulate causation. In this regard, we exemplify how community systems provide various non-genetic ‘scaffoldings’, ‘constraints’, and ‘affordances’ for individual and sociocultural evolutionary development. Such research complements prevailing models that focus on the vertical transmission of heritable information, from parent to offspring, with research that instead focusses on horizontal, oblique and even reverse information transmission, going from offspring to parent. We call this reversed information transfer the ‘offspring effect’ to contrast it from the ‘parental effect’. We argue that the proposed approach to inheritance is effective for modelling cumulative and distributed developmental process and for explaining the biological origins and evolution of language. (shrink)

Many who evoke the term solidarity are influenced by an underlying sense of urgency and whether the use of the term plays upon an intellectual concept or harnesses solidarity’s more practical expressions, this political buzzword wields influence. _European Solidarity_ proposes a variety of sophisticated historical and theoretical conceptualizations of solidarity, while simultaneously exposing the practical implications of its contemporary expressions. An empirical investigation of solidarity’s crucial challenges in the EU today and a comprehensive consideration of the history of the term (...) in the context of changing social, religious, and political conditions within Europe, _European Solidarity_ will be required reading for scholars and students of social theory and European studies alike. (shrink)